The House at Wintermere

When survival demands sacrifice, can love find another way?Governess Annabel Chase has learned that genteel poverty offers little mercy. After her father’s death stripped away her comfortable life in Bath, she’s desperate enough to accept a position at the remote Wintermere Hall in Devon-sight unseen, employer unknown, with winter closing in and nowhere else to go.She expects an elderly lord and conventional duties. Instead, she finds:• Edward Carmichael, Lord Wintermere-barely thirty, devastatingly handsome, and carrying the weight of an estate drowning in debt • Catherine-his brilliant twelve-year-old daughter who challenges every assumption about women’s intellectual capabilities • A house haunted by secrets-including the tragic tale of Sister Margaret, who chose duty over love three centuries ago and still walks the grounds in ethereal sorrowThe Victorian era demands strict boundaries between employers and servants, but passion recognizes no such rules.As forbidden attraction ignites between the impoverished governess and her tormented employer, Edward faces financial ruin that threatens everything: his ancestral estate, his daughter’s future, the livelihoods of everyone who depends on him. Lady Pemberton offers salvation-her vast fortune in exchange for marriage to a man she’s never met.The choice seems impossible: marry for money and lose his soul, or follow his heart and lose everything else.But Annabel refuses to accept defeat. Armed with progressive educational philosophy and Catherine’s brilliant mind, she proposes a radical solution-transform Wintermere Hall itself into England’s most innovative school for young women. It’s ambitious, untested, and completely contrary to everything society expects from a Victorian estate.Stakes escalate when their secret romance is discovered, threatening not just their reputations but the fragile community they’re building. With supernatural guidance from Sister Margaret’s restless spirit and their own unshakeable faith in each other, Edward and Annabel must prove that love combined with intelligence can overcome any obstacle-social prejudice, financial ruin, even centuries of tragic precedent.A sweeping historical romance that combines forbidden love with social revolution, Gothic atmosphere with progressive ideals, and proves that some happy endings are worth fighting for across lifetimes.